On the show, you talk about how your parents' limitations affected the way that you are as a parent.
My household was not the typical household, because I grew up with a celebrity father and he was a musician. My mother was a very dedicated mom, and a very young mom, so she was learning as she went. She gave us so much love; we never went without her love. And my father loved us very much, but he wasn't hands-on, because he was doing his own thing.
And we were raised basically by my mom and my aunt. It lent itself to a less structured type of a lifestyle. It wasn't your everyday family that sat down at 6:00 and had dinner. We just weren't like that. It was more like nothing was scheduled completely or regimented, but my mom made sure we had lunches when we went to school and that we got to school. And she disciplined us when she thought it was necessary. She did her best, but it just wasn't what you normally see. So I tend to be more relaxed about parenting than my husband.
Who is fantastic, by the way. Sometimes on Supernanny, you see the husbands kind of waft in and out, but yours seemed so hands-on, which was refreshing.
Oh, that's wonderful. That's great. Yes, he is very hands-on and he adores the children. And you know, we're really a solid, united front and we love our children more than anything and that's our life. That's our whole life. We hardly ever go out or anything. It's all about the kids and we love it. That's the way we want it.
He's also a musician?
Yeah. He's not in a band right now, but he wants to form another band. He used to be the lead singer of a band. The band was called Death Valley Jupiter and he's produced, and he writes — he's a great writer — and he's a sound engineer.
"I feel bad for Britney, I do."
That's what he does on a daily level, but he wants to go into doing sound for television. That would be ideal for us.
I'm wondering about your take on the celebrity baby craze, like the frenzy around Britney, and the sale of baby pictures for millions of dollars?
You know, I want to be careful when I speak about anybody else, but I feel bad for Britney, I do. I feel really bad, because it breaks my heart to see any mother have her children taken away from her. That's the hardest thing for me to see, but I realize obviously she needs some guidance right now. But I don't really know her situation. I know what the tabloids say is usually not right, so I don't know, I don't even know what to believe, to be honest. I just, as a mother, feel bad for her. As far as the baby-photo-selling, that's almost like exploitation. That seems a little strange to me, people selling pictures like that. I think it's kind of creepy, actually.
I'm wondering if you experienced any kind of pressure about breastfeeding or sleep-scheduling or anything like that.
You know what? I've realized that, now that I've had four kids, I'm at the point where I'm not really going to care what anybody else tells me. You just have to go with what works for you. For instance, I really wanted to breastfeed, but for some reason, I don't know if it was being too anxious about not producing enough milk or just that I was just too frazzled or whatever, but with each child, I only breastfed for three weeks. That was it for me and then I went to bottles. Sometimes I beat myself up for that, but at least they got colostrum and I'm okay with that, because that's what it was and I can't change it now. But they're fine. They're all good. Everybody does it differently, and that's what I did.
©2008 Ada Calhoun and Nerve Media
About the Author
|
|
Related Articles
|
|
Babble editor-in-chief
Ada Calhoun is also a blogger for AOL News, a consulting editor at Nerve.com, and a frequent contributor to the New York Times Book Review. Her writing has appeared in New York magazine, Marie Claire, Salon.com and the anthology One of the Guys. |
|
|
-
by Sarah Hepola
On why his son won't eat meat or be a child actor.
-
by Aaron Burgess
The rock icon and dad on his newest baby: Kidzapalooza.
-
by Justin Clark
"I don't have a mental manual of how I'm raising my kids."
|
